Midge checks in after his first R6 Cup season

What's up y'all?

Now the season's over, I've no racing to write about... So I have to keep myself busy to give you all something to read when you're bored! Winter sucks, aye?

Since the season ended I've mostly been working on a brochure for that well known 'EARCH FOR FUNDS PROJECT' we racers know oh so much about. I don't wanna bore you to death with that too much but I've had to teach myself all kinds of new PC programmes to design and lay out the brochure myself. I'm pretty pleased with the results but the ultimate test will be to see if it can reduce our credit card bills to a more manageable size. Being able to get to the front door after the postman's been would be a start...

The lovely Ariane from Red Bull came up to see me last month and I just knew it was gonna be bad news " I could just tell. I was right. It seems that the World of Formula One is an expensive one and I'm by no means the only RB athlete getting the chop and that's globally, not just the UK. They've been fantastic to me since the early Red Bull Rookies project back in 2002 and I can't complain about the way I have been treated " it's a great company to be associated with in every way.

But business is business and marketing budgets are marketing budgets and money is finite. I wish them every success with Air Race and Formula One and hope to work with them again one day when they come to their senses. Only kidding, Ariane. In some ways over the past couple of years the Red Bull deal has been a bit of a handicap in that people think you're rolling in it with Red Bull money (not the case). I lost a few deals too because I wasn't allowed to run any branding on my lid at all. Now, I can officially state, this is definitely not the case. Is that hint heavy enough?

Lately, Craig Jones (who lives just down the road from me) and myself have been out on the MotoX-ers and Pit Bikes, just to fulfil the need to ride a motorcycle like a twat. Been busy racing him around his home-made track, and learning freestyle tricks over the jumps. I'm pretty stoked that I now have a heel-clicker and can-can to can-can lander nailed. We need a bigger jump now!

I've been doing as much skateboarding as possible as well. Skateboarding is the bollocks for balance and coordination and is the most killer cardiovascular training, not to mention 'hit-yourself' kind of sport on the vert ramp, and the mini's.. (Thanks for the coaching Joe & Adz!). We've got an awesome indoor skatepark in Peterborough, Y2SK8, but it's particularly annoying to see these kids who don't even come up to your chest nailing tricks that I can't do. Jonesy's threatening to get his poofy in-line skates out and come and show me a thing or two but, despite all the hot air, he hasn't shown up at Y2SK8 yet. Here's hoping.

I did another shoot for RiDE Magazine last week. They were using me as a pet-racer/monkey to really test their RiDE recommended protective clothing rather than just doing it down some laboratory. Now, ahem, I certainly don't consider myself a crasher but I've had a couple of offs this year and it's proved a really good way for them to evaluate just how good my gear is. I had a whopper at Oulton that smacked me into the tarmac at about 70mph. I hit my chest so hard I was coughing blood up for a few hours afterwards. But, I have to say my kit did the job. Big up to Carrera leathers, Aplinestars for the superb boots, Shoei for a top lid and Held for super-tough gloves. The feature's out in the next issue of RiDE, so keep them in business by getting yourself a copy... Or five!

Last but not least, I plan to leave you all in the stinking cold of a shit British winter to head down to New Zealand over Xmas and the New Year. It's summer there at the moment. My Dad, who's a Kiwi, is building some houses down there so I can do some hard-graft labouring and train like mad to gain some weight for next year. Obviously I could do that training thing at home in the UK, but the wakeboarding, surfing and jet-skiing in Peterborough is pretty rubbish in December. Heh, heh.

See you all soon,

Next update will be from down-under.

Cheers..

Midge#53